Experts to understand whether cloud computing can save energy and reduce emissions?

Cloud computing allows users to transfer data to and from a remote datacenter for storage and processing at any time, which can greatly save space resources, and can bring many conveniences to people. Even reported that cloud computing can "help http://www.aliyun.com/zixun/aggregation/39398.html" > Energy-saving emission reduction. In a new survey, however, the researchers compared the energy losses of cloud computing with conventional computing, and found the unknown side of cloud computing: cloud computing services itself consumes a lot of energy and may also be the source of carbon dioxide.

The researchers found that in high intensity use, the amount of energy spent using cloud computing for data transmission is much greater than that stored in data.

Jayante? Bariga Jayant Baliga and his collaborators from the University of Melbourne found that cloud computing is not always the greenest option. Their research will be published at the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (Proceedings of the IEEE). In the survey, they applied cloud computing to three different services in both public and private systems, including storage, software, and data processing, and then tested the energy consumption of different services. They found that transferring data between data centers and home computers consumes more energy than storing data. However, previous research on cloud computing energy consumption focused only on the energy consumption of data centers.

In general, no one notices the energy costs of transmitting data, because people are always praising cloud computing for other features of cloud computing.

"As the use of cloud services soars, its energy consumption will also rise," said Rod Tucker, head of the University of Melbourne Research Group, LOTAC. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, in 2007, carbon dioxide production in servers and data centers accounted for 0.5% of U.S. greenhouse gas production. If such business continues, greenhouse gas emissions due to the energy consumption of data centers are expected to double in 2007-2020 years. If we do not pay attention to the energy consumption of cloud services, the spread of cloud services will become an important source of greenhouse gas emissions. "As a result, we need to develop technology and research strategies to address this problem before cloud services are used more broadly," he said. "said Tucker.

Tucker said that when the energy consumption of cloud-based services was compared to a single desktop, the energy consumed in the process of uploading data from the user to the cloud was also included. "It's important if cloud services are provided through a public network." "he said. Currently, some media reports that cloud computing provides a more "green" way to save energy than desktop computing. However, none of these media has covered the energy consumption generated by data from users to the cloud. "In many cases, we can see that the data centers that provide cloud services are located in other cities, states or other countries," he said. "This means that there is a lot of energy consumption in the transmission process.

The researchers found that in the occasional use of cloud storage services or low-intensity use, cloud computing consumes much less energy than conventional computing consumes. Because, in the low intensity use situation, the storage data energy consumption occupies the entire energy consumption most, transmits the data to consume very little. In contrast, in high intensity use, the transmission of data consumption of energy accounted for the majority. It is particularly noteworthy that when using cloud computing for private and public storage services, the energy used to transmit data can be as low as 10% and 25%. In high-intensity use, this number is 60% and 90%, respectively.

The study also found that, overall, cloud storage services consume less energy than cloud software and cloud processing. Public cloud processing services consume more energy than private cloud processing services.

Of course, the results of this study are different for different user meanings. Home computer users can use the low-end computer for day-to-day work tasks to save energy, or occasionally use cloud processing services to carry out intensive work tasks. Private clouds, because of their size, may not benefit too much from energy-saving technologies.

The researchers suggest that the most needed improvement is to improve the energy efficiency of data transmission. Because, as cloud computing is heavily used, this problem will become tricky.

(Responsible editor: The good of the Legacy)